Mark Twain, a Biography — Volume I, Part 1: 1835-1866 eBook

“I am not able to dig in the streets,”
he added, and Orion, who records this, adds:

“I can see yet the hopeless expression of his
face.”

During a former period of depression, such as this,
death had come into the Clemens home. It came
again now. Little Benjamin, a sensitive, amiable
boy of ten, one day sickened, and died within a week,
May 12, 1842. He was a favorite child and his
death was a terrible blow. Little Sam long remembered
the picture of his parents’ grief; and Orion
recalls that they kissed each other, something hitherto
unknown.

Judge Clemens went back to his law and judicial practice.
Mrs. Clemens decided to take a few boarders.
Orion, by this time seventeen and a very good journeyman
printer, obtained a place in St. Louis to aid in the
family support.

The tide of fortune having touched low-water mark,
the usual gentle stage of improvement set in.
Times grew better in Hannibal after those first two
or three years; legal fees became larger and more frequent.
Within another two years judge Clemens appears to
have been in fairly hopeful circumstances again—­able
at least to invest some money in silkworm culture
and lose it, also to buy a piano for Pamela, and to
build a modest house on the Hill Street property,
which a rich St. Louis cousin, James Clemens, had
preserved for him. It was the house which is known
today as the “Mark Twain Home.”—­[’This
house, in 1911, was bought by Mr. and Mrs. George
A. Mahan, and presented to Hannibal for a memorial
museum.]—­Near it, toward the corner of Main
Street, was his office, and here he dispensed law
and justice in a manner which, if it did not bring
him affluence, at least won for him the respect of
the entire community. One example will serve:

Next to his office was a stone-cutter’s shop.
One day the proprietor, Dave Atkinson, got into a
muss with one “Fighting” MacDonald, and
there was a tremendous racket. Judge Clemens
ran out and found the men down, punishing each other
on the pavement.

“I command the peace!” he shouted, as
he came up to them.

No one paid the least attention.

“I command the peace!” he shouted again,
still louder, but with no result.

A stone-cutter’s mallet lay there, handy.
Judge Clemens seized it and, leaning over the combatants,
gave the upper one, MacDonald, a smart blow on the
head.

“I command the peace!” he said, for the
third time, and struck a considerably smarter blow.

That settled it. The second blow was of the sort
that made MacDonald roll over, and peace ensued.
Judge Clemens haled both men into his court, fined
them, and collected his fee. Such enterprise in
the cause of justice deserved prompt reward.

XI

DAYS OF EDUCATION

The Clemens family had made one or two moves since
its arrival in Hannibal, but the identity of these
temporary residences and the period of occupation
of each can no longer be established. Mark Twain
once said: